Waste Vegetable Oil and Biodiesel thread?

[BCDelica]

Hey Mark, now I'm bothering you to add a WVO and biodiesel category. Seems a couple of guys are planning to convert and I'm interested to hear how Lost1 did his conversion.

Ciao

[mark]

Great suggestion Kevin... Done!


:D

[mitch]

Id love to pick anyones brain about making their own biodiesel... I just got a 90 Delica and am researching how to make fuel.. i'll keep you posted as well, Anyone have any proven recipes? Mods's? building a biodiesel processor??

cheers
mitch

[hutch]

Hey Mitch,
There was an article this summer in the TC talking about a society starting up sometime. I understand they're still dealing with the rules for joing etc. and will be making an announcement. They're not taking members yet until they've got it all sorted.
hutch

[BCDelica]

Hi Mitch,

I went the WVO route, less handling for personal use.

I have had some hands on with two biodiesel processors, the best being a vacuum system based on Joe Street's @ http://www.nonprofitfuel.ca/Reactor.html http://journeytoforever.org/biodiesel_p ... #touchfree - check out the build manual! ( This is my personal favorite, digging into my past career as a chemist). Get a stainless methoxide mixing vessel though. In the mountain of information out there the best list, IMO, is http://journeytoforever.org/biodiesel_processor.html.

Kev - go greasy.

[mitch]

when you talk about WVO is that staight "waste oil" (deep fryer oil) that you put staight into your van? start it on deisel, switch it to heated filtered WVO while driving?

Id love to make bio diesel but if I can burn this stuff staight outta the deep fryer im in for sure! you built a stainless tank where the spare tire was?

Fill me in... thanks for the links.

Mitch

Just finished lifting the van 2", going for 30" tires tomorrow. i'll post pic's after that. loving the van so far, no problems yet... anything to watch for?

[BCDelica]

Yup, that's what I mean, well filtered waste veggie powers our Van's well over 90 percent of the time. I went that way as after you have converted the vehicle, you just have to filter and store the WVO, less muss and fuss then homebrewed biodiesel. If I had one of the following; a neighborhood coop, many friends with diesels, or nice diesel boat (still dreaming) I would go the biodiesel route.

On one van we split the existing tanks, easy but it's small capacity; on my work van I took a tank out of a Jeep YJ and installed it where the spare tank was - nice fit.

That's great a 2" lift, I want one. Wouldn't you be able to fit 31 * 10.5 BF Mud terrains with that lift, I bet you could. It'd look great. One van has 30*9 and our family van with stock mags has 235/75/15 which fit with room to spare.
:P

Kev - still dreaming about a Deli' on 35" Swampers...... :lol:

[mitch]

Hey Kev,

Good advice.. im finding the same thing in my reseach that bio is'nt as easy as i thought. what if any mods do you have to do to run WVO? Engine stuff... aside from extra tank, 3 way conector, pump.....

you still run it on reg diesel so it cant be much right?

what does your temp gauge run at? mine barely moves (runs cool) which is good i guess, just want to make sure its working.

Mitch

[tree guy]

http://www.freedomfuels.net/

I know a bunch of guys that have these to make B.D.

Cheers

[BCDelica]

The biggest mod has been to install a fuel tank and filler for the WVO. The converter and wiring wasn't bad, just a one day install. We did a lot of driving in the last three weeks (once to Vancouver and once to Nanaimo) and I just topperd up with diesel for the first time in Courtenay last night, $4.30 but the last 30 cents spilled on the ground. Another thing I hate about diesel, wish I could go with a single tank systems reliability in the winter!

And Mitch when we went to Edmonton this summer we knew we couldn't pack enough veggie so we actually had to pay for fuel! But even though it seems people are not getting the mileage out of there new Delica's that they thought they would, it took just $100 of diesel to drive from Edmonton to Powell River! I can live with that, our Astro van took well over $300 of to pull our travel trailer to Pentiction and back.

By the way, the only time our temperature gauge has ever really climbed above that second little mark was driving over the Coquihalla in August. We stopped a couple of times to be safe and the temperature gauge dropped pretty fast at idle, it never got as hot well driving over in December! Back in December the van still had the Blizzac tires that it came with, and I tell ya it was the safest and stickiest winter highway vehicle I have ever driven (meant to tell Mark about that!)

Kev - would love one of those pre - made processor's

[BCDelica]

That's great artwork Mitch, as an old cyclist I would love one of those pieces!

Did you do the lift for your Delica yourself! I have thought of winding up the front all the way and after having the rear leaf's resprung installing slightly larger shackles, which should give ya 1.5".

Here a brief rum down of my first WVO install:


They have pictures of my van's engine in the more photos of the Gallery http://gocanola.com/gallery2.html.

1) On the converter, the pink lines are taped into the rear heater core lines, the black braided line tucked in behind is the diesel supply line, the blue line is WVO oil supply; 1/2" for good flow, the brown plastic line is the fuel return to converter, and the line with the glass filter in the supply to the fuel pump. The converter is quite light and bolted to the fuel rail in three places, though the bracket took almost 5 hours to get right, made of aluminium.

The converter has a 20 amp glow plug, the yellow wire, for quick heat up; and solenoid in the back , black with 3 red wires and 1 white wire on top to a thermocouple.

2) Tried making a litre or 2 of biodiesel, lots of instructions on the web. I did, didn't like it: harmful chemicals, waste esters and soapy water left over, and most biodiesel clouds up at -11c. I stuck mine in the freezer along with some WVO, which doesn't change much, but the biodiesel clouds up in 1/2 hr and gels overnight.

I was invited to a demo to make biodiesel and was extremely unimpressed. They heated the barrel of WVO with a tiger torch with 4 gals of methanol 10 feet away, and; said they dump all their waste sludge in the woods and then don't filter or wash the BD, just settle it and take it off the top. Put that in a $40 k dodge 4by. LOL>

3) Mixing in one tank gets very mixed reviews, but it gets cold in Canada, Eh. I'd run 50/50 happily in my diesel tank in the summer only, our van started instantly if it sat overnight on WVO when it was over 15c plus. Less then 10c is a problem though, and manually purging the line then, which sucks to do in 4c and raining weather at 6 am. I do keep a suction pump in back, in case we forget to switch to diesel in the last 2 to 3 minutes for overnight or such.

4)Single tank systems would work fine in Mexico.

5) My delica came with two tanks. The rear tanks is the larger of the two and combined with a 53 litre tank from Canadian Tire Fuel Tank in the back gives us great range. We have driven over 600 Km's out of town on WVO only, my 17 year old daughter even did the filling. I got that tank cause I don't want to chance any spills.

Separating the two tanks was easy, but they shared venting at first, which when my wife or kids did the WVO filling, always having to squeeze extra in the tank, it then flowed into the diesel tank. I recently vented the diesel to the filler only, and the WVO oil has a 5/8 vent line up to a marine fuel vent up at the main filler cap. My only challenge left is to separate the fuel gauges, to show the level on the tank which I'm running.

6) I purchased two converters from Gocanola. They include everything but the wire runs and hoses. They gave me the, wiring, the blue and pink hose for the van, cause I bought 2, my second kit doesn't have a dash switch, wiring or hoses. The converter includes glow plug, solenoid, thermocouple, relay, fuse block, and should include a switch.

7) I installed a lower radiator AC heater for quick engine warm in minus weather.

Still will post a full pic essay of my other install one day.

[mitch]

Thanks for the great info kev, I just finished my 1st road trip with the delica up tp the hotsprings in pemby. I am off tomorrow to mexico to check out the Baja 1000, but not with the Delica (next time) I would love to talk more about WVO when im back.. 21st. I will check out sourcing some of those parts. Stoked to give this a try!

When you say fill up.. are you pumping WVO right outta the waste bins or taking it home and filetering it 1st? I was thinking what it would take to have an electric pump hooked up to a heated tip hose, heated fuel filters, run it off your manual choke for mega power, pump it into a large heated tank where the spare tire is.. all hidden under an extended bumper off the back that would carry my dirt bike.... any good pump ideas to run on 12 volt?

Ive been popin my head into some of the many grease dumpsters in the city, most are solid grease, but lots are liquid oil which I assume Is good stuff.

[mitch]

hey kev,

what do you think about these kits on wwwgreasecar.com ??? seems more compete then the go-canola, and i cant seem to contact them.. any local phone number for them?

Are you using any other extra pump between your WVO tank and your injector.. have you had to work on your injector at all? any lines on getting one rebuild if need be?

Mitch

boosted your turbo at all?

[BCDelica]

I like the grease car kit, have you tried http://www.plantdrive.com/ they use the Vormax filter which is a good idea but pricey. And where to mount it... I know there is lots out there but http://frybrid.com/ is my favorite from the high end system, seen in running on a 98 Benz!

I have no extra pump on either Deli' I just use fat delivery lines (1/2" and 3/8" I.D.) and don't filter till after the converter. We have been running great on 95%, or better, WVO for a year now; now I want to change glow pugs and do something about the injectors. Don't know much about diesel injectors but our Deli' is actually pushing out some black smoke well running on the veggie. It's never done that before, just clear exhaust and the fast food smell. Really want to find out what has changed. I think it's the injector's or the diesel pump's timing, but just grasping at straws here.

Would like to boost the turbo, seems easy - would go great with propane injection! but hey you'd be surprised at the high end power gain with veggie!

How's was the Baja!! Nice to be back to snow. 8)

Kev

[cordom]

great info guys! i am intrested in using unused canola oil as it seems less
complicated, no filters ect. where would i buy canola oil in bulk at what
cost to make cost effective,has anybody had any luck going this route?